Sex, not Love

Coming off such a great series, I knew I needed something different. I knew I couldn’t do another paranormal fantasy because there are only a few authors that can go toe to toe with Ilona Andrews writing and they haven’t published anything new. So instead, I went with something a little raunchy and enjoyed the change of pace. And a warning to future readers, don’t start reading this book an hour before you need to go bed because you have work the next day. You are not going to want to put the book down.

We met at a wedding—him sitting on the groom’s side, me sitting on the bride’s. Stealing glances at each other throughout the night, there was no denying an intense, mutual attraction.

I caught the bouquet; he caught the garter. Hunter held me tightly while we danced and suggested we explore the chemistry sparking between us. His blunt, dirty mouth should’ve turned me off. But for some crazy reason, it had the opposite effect on me.

We ended up back in my hotel room. The next morning, I headed home to New York leaving him behind in California with the wrong number.

I thought about him often, but after my last relationship, I’d sworn off of charming, cocky, gorgeous-as-sin men. A year later, Hunter and I met again at the birth of our friends’ baby. Our attraction hadn’t dulled one bit. After a whirlwind trip, he demanded a real phone number this time. So I left him with my mother’s—she could scare away any man with her talks of babies and marriage—and flew back home.

I’d thought it was funny, until the following week when he rang the bell at Mom’s house for Sunday night dinner. The crazy, gorgeous man had won over my mother and taken an eight-week assignment in my city. He proposed we spend that time screwing each other out of our systems.

Eight weeks of mind-blowing sex with no strings attached? What did I have to lose?

Nothing, I thought.
It’s just sex, not love.
But you know what they say about the best laid plans…

Review:Ok, before you say anything, I know the book starts off a little cheesy and might be over the top. But if you just go with it, I guarantee you will be smiling. Besides, that’s the fun part of books like these. Yes, the overarching plot is predictable: damaged sexy guy meets attractive woman, lots of hot sex, conflict and inevitable breakup, realization guy (sometimes woman) doesn’t actually want breakup, pleading forgiveness, happy ending. But this book is no exception. So why read it? Because it’s fun to get lost in the banter, sexual tension, and reading something that would never happen but would be fun if it did.

Before digging into this book, understand that this is not your typical romantic comedy. As always, Keeland delivers mouth watering alpha male with a sinfully cocky mouth. But the difference between this book and others is the amount of pain and heartache you have to endure. I don’t typically enjoy reading books with this much heartache and part of my rating reflects that.

Hunter is cocky with a dirty mouth and let’s not forget sexy as hell. He’s aggressive, with a great body but he sends the worst mixed messages I have ever seen. He doesn’t want to be in a relationship but he wants to do everything one would do in a relationship. For example – having dinner/dates together, meeting/getting involved with her family, being monogamous, spending all your time together. So tell me how this isn’t a relationship? Oh right, this is what a relationship looks like when you have commitment phobia. A little hint – Hunters not the only one who has this..

Hunter’s character isn’t at all what I was expecting. He has this sweet side to him that surprisingly overpowers his dominant alpha male side. And the protective side of him is really cute. But like most characters we read in books similar to this, he is damaged. What happened to his brother is terrifying and horrible. But does that give him the right to peruse Natalia, make her fall in love him – all within 2 months – to then leave her because of some messed up logic? Regardless of his reasoning behind doing this, what he did to her was a dick move and the book lost a star because of it.

Natalia comes with a lot of baggage. Taking care of her step daughter, Izzy, full time is not easy. Especially when her ex is in prison for running a Ponzi scheme and Izzy, being a typical 10th grader, hates everything about her. I can imagine it would be close to impossible having any kind of sex life being a single mom, living in New York City, and raising a teen. But she finds a way and the sex between her and Hunter is fun to read.

This book isn’t my favorite from Vi Keeland but I still enjoyed reading it. Parts of this book were predictable but overall there are unique aspects to the book. The romance is exciting and I love the sexual tension between Natalia and Hunter.